Page 31 of Cooped Up for Christmas

I heaved off the bed and started getting dressed, but his staring at me was distracting so I nearly tripped into my slacks. Yeah. He’s that good.

“Stop it. I have to go.”

“Am I stopping you?”

I glared at him and quickly finished dressing, then I checked myself in the mirror—to make sure I wasn’t sporting Something About Mary—and turned to him. “You should go into the bathroom.”

He grinned at me. “Why?”

“So no one sees you when I open the door. We can’t let the staff know this happened.”

“Why not?”

Was he nuts? “It’s not appropriate.”

“I’ve heard that inappropriate is much more fun.”

I nearly growled out loud. “We’re not here for fun, Coop. We’re working.”

“Oh. Right. Okay.” He sucked in a deep breath and stood. “I’ll go hide in your shower so no one can see me when you open the door. And then later, when they least expect it, I can come out of your bedroom and pretend to be lost.”

“What?” What was he talking about?

He took my cheeks in his hands and kissed my nose. I hated when he did that. Well, kind of. “They already know about us, Vic.”

“No, they don’t. This just happened, for Pete’s sake! How could they know?”

He laughed and shook his head. “It’s a small cabin, Vic. You’re not exactly, um, the silent type?”

Heat flamed my cheeks. “Oh no. They didn’t hear. Tell me they didn’t hear?”

“They heard.” A chorus reverberated from the kitchen.

Oh horrors.

Bloody fricking hell.

Oh well. At least there was nothing to hide now.

Chapter Eight

The 23rd was supposed to be a quiet day with guests relaxing around the lodge, watching movies, soaking in the hot tub. You know. Quiet.

You gotta love quiet days.

But, apparently, Farley and Jamison were having a fight.

There was no quiet in the guest lodge whatsoever, what with the yelling, stomping, slamming of doors, and whatnot.

Farley even sent poor Jaxon to yell at Jamison for her—when she got tired, one presumes.

And then there was that kerfuffle when Lola turned up missing again before lunch.

She was with Mason, of course, and that was the first place we looked…that time and the six that followed. I was beginning to suspect those two dogs were in love, as ludicrous as that might seem.

After I rescued Lola from Mason’s wet snout for the fourth time, I walked in on Olivia loading the Baccarat crystal goblets into the dishwasher. Thank God I walked in. “No, hon,” I told her. “These can’t go in the dishwasher. We wash them by hand.”

“Why?”